And Now... Europe's Kristallnacht

They carried banners saying, "Stop Israeli State Terror," but some went off-message, deciding, apparently, that it did not matter if their targets were Israelis or not.

In the Netherlands, fresh from a pro-ISIS rally in Amsterdam, the home of the Chief Rabbi -- not Israeli, just Jewish -- was attacked twice in one week.

We live in a rightful disgust for racism of any kind. And yet here we see -- and nowhere more clearly than in Germany -- the new racist nightmare for Europe.

The backlash in Europe against Israel has been underway since the beginning of Operation Protective Edge. In each country the protests have similarities. And in each they are spear-headed by the same motives and often by the same people.

In London the protests have been dominated young Muslims with the usual smattering of far-left fellow-travellers. They have carried Socialist Worker Party banners saying "Stop Israeli State Terror." But some went off-message, apparently deciding it did not matter if their targets were Israeli or "just" Jews. There have also been the predictable banners comparing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with Adolf Hitler. Others have a more confused relationship with this sinister conflation. One young protestor was photographed at a demonstration outside the Israeli Embassy in London with a poster saying, "Hitler you were right!" Elsewhere the protests have spilled over into occasional outbursts of violence.

Scenes from Europe, July 2014: Left, an anti-Israel protestor in London holds up a sign saying "Hitler you were right". Right, one of a group of anti-Israel thugs who stormed a soccer field in Austria assaults a player from the Israeli team Maccabi Haifa.

People who are "visibly Jewish," people wearing identifiably Jewish dress, have found themselves targeted for abuse. Demonstrators at the biggest central London march assaulted and verbally abused a Jewish woman who had expressed her support for Israel, calling her a "Jew Zionist" among other things, before stealing her mobile phone. In North London, a rabbi was abused by a group of 'youths' who shouted "F*** the Zionists," "F*** the Jews" and "Allah Akhbar."

All of this is mild compared to what has been going on across the English Channel in France. In suburbs and parts of central Paris the violence being perpetrated against the Jewish community culminated in the disturbing spectacle of Parisian Jews barricaded in a synagogue by a crowd of young North Africans seemingly intent on violence. When the police failed to turn up in any numbers, the Jews fought for themselves. These were not all "Jewish vigilantes" as some of the press disturbingly reported -- Jews in their 40s and 50s fighting their way through a mob.

Since then, the French authorities have banned -- as French authorities have the right to do -- some other planned "pro-Palestinian" protests. But the bans seem not to have worked. "Youths," as the media are prone to title the rioters, who mainly come from the suburbs of Paris and other cities, have taken to the streets, anyhow. There are videos of them smashing up pavements in order to get chunks of asphalt to hurl at police. A Paris suburb with a large Jewish -- not Israeli, just Jewish -- population has been a particular focus of protestors. In some video footage, protestors have been shown attacking police cars and assaulting public and private property. The French authorities are clearly trying to get a handle on the protests, but to a considerable extent, events have slipped from their control.

Similar scenes have been seen across the continent. In the Netherlands -- fresh from witnessing a pro-ISIS rally in Amsterdam -- there have been serious incidents at protests. There have been anti-Semitic chants, and the home of the Chief Rabbi in the Netherlands has been attacked twice in one week. In Austria, a soccer game involving an Israeli team had to be called off after Palestinian demonstrators broke onto the pitch. The stands had people waving anti-Israel banners and Turkish flags. But once they were on the pitch, the protestors assaulted the Israeli players, doing flying kicks at them and then further kicking and punching them. Some of the Israeli players fought back and the game was halted.

Most disturbing of all, perhaps, have been events in Germany. During pro-Palestinian protests in Berlin and other German cities, there were chants of "Death to the Jews" and "Gas the Jews." The president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, Dieter Graumann, described some of the demonstrations as "an explosion of evil and violence-prone hatred of Jews. Never in our lives did we believe it possible that antisemitism of the nastiest and most primitive kind would be chanted on the streets of Germany."

And it is in Germany that such sentiments have met their most appropriate public and political opposition. There, at least, the nature of these protests has not been glossed over. On the contrary there has been a suitable soul-racking over this. How could such a cry have gone up in this country, of all countries? The major German magazine, Bild, has run a cover with the headline, "Raise your voice: Never again Jew Hatred!" The cover is dotted with famous figures in German public life from the President and Chancellor Merkel to other political and public figures. The montage sends out a powerful message. The question is, of course, whether that is enough.

Certainly, across Europe there is a new hatred in the air -- but this hatred is also the old one. The people on the streets of Paris, Berlin, London, Amsterdam and other cities across Europe include the descendants of some of those who fought against, fought for, allied or collaborated with the evil regime which spurred this hatred on last time. But most of the perpetrators are not those people. Most of them are of immigrant backgrounds. In Britain, these are mainly from the Indian sub-continent (with a smaller group from the Gulf countries); in France and the Netherlands, they are from North Africa; in Germany and Austria, largely from Turkey.

All the peoples of Europe can see this but none of them want to identify it. We live so in terror of being politically incorrect. We live in a rightful disgust for racism of any kind. And yet here we see -- and nowhere more clearly than in Germany -- the new racist nightmare for Europe. We thought we had abolished the beast of anti-Semitism from our shores and had made it totally unacceptable. And yet here are people Europe has imported in their millions, failed in varying degrees to assimilate and who now (in considerable numbers) look as if they have taken up precisely the hatred we had all hoped to have left behind. These are dark days in the Middle East. But they are darker days in Europe. Whether we deal with this returned evil or not will be the challenge of this generation.

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23 Reader Comments

George • Aug 3, 2014 at 10:21

Attacks on Jews or their religious leaders, in Europe, are appalling and cannot be allowed to go unpunished. This is racism. However, what the Israelis are perpetrating in Gaza seems to be worse. Hamas may be odious in the extreme, but the were elected by the voters in Gaza. So when the Israelis say they want to destroy Hamas, what are they really saying?Surely being anti semitic implies being against both Jews and Arabs.

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tim • Jul 31, 2014 at 23:06

I wish there was a quick fix to the trouble we are facing today. We have learnt from history that hatred will only lead to more hate and destruction. Hamas is using dirty tactics and unfortunately the Israel army is playing the same dirty game. Enough is enough. And these unfortunate events that are happening in Europe are lead by ignorant uneducated people with a mob mentality who are easily lead into doing stupid things. The Jews in Europe have nothing to do with what's happening in middle east. The same thing applies to other religions and ethnicity. The Turks and the north africans don't represent Germany or other EU nations.
They represent themselves and their beliefs.
So please try not to throw all the Europeans into the same boat.

Peace.

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Eve • Jul 30, 2014 at 22:18

We can all stop being being politically correct and tell these people who chant "death to the Jews" that we don't want their crap here and if they continue, we don't want them here. Act on that, start sending them back.

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Hanna • Jul 30, 2014 at 06:43

Throughout history Jews have been kicked out of almost every country in the world, especially in Europe. Life in these countries has rarely improved when they became free of Jews, or Judenrein. In most of these countries both the economy and the culture suffered greatly and they declined eventually. The Jews, on the other hand, survived and continue to survive, and built the most democratic and free country in the world. God bless Israel and keep it safe. Hanna. USA.

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Hepcat • Jul 29, 2014 at 04:13

Moral inversion at the UN: The 'Human Rights' Council voted 29-1 to investigate Israel's "war crimes"

When Hillel Neuer from UN Watch mentioned that 2,000 Palestinians were murdered by Assad's regime, Syria's delegate raised a motion to silence him.

Neuer regained the floor and replied: "Let the world note that in a session purportedly on Palestinian human rights, the government of Syria objected to us mentioning the 1800 Palestinians that they starved and murdered."

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johnqpublius • Jul 28, 2014 at 23:44

Do a majority of the world's people really hate Jews so much?I hope not. I once visited Auschwitz. At the time it was a very subtle and spooky museum. I hope it still is.

There is no moral equivalence here folks.

Islamists are people of hate. It is cowardly to hide weapons behind the skirts of women and the innocence of children.

It is said "that whom the gods would destroy they first make mad", and the present sanctioned Jew hatred in Europe is a case in point. The European leadership naively thinks that their bland platitudes will stem the tide of the genocidal anti-Semitism imported into their their respective countries. They are wrong, and though they won't say so in public, the political elites have lost control. Yes, it will be a tragic situation for the Jews, but it will be Europe's neck that is next placed on the Islamist chopping block.

Every country in Europe has a below replacement birth rate, and the entire continent is in the largest demographic free fall since the Black Death in 1346. European liberal civilization is dying before our eyes, but in most quarters it is not politically correct to say so. Much the pity, because the the downfall that the West is facing is going to crash in on the everybody, regardless of their denial. Europe is going to get what it so richly deserves as it turns its backs on its Jews for the second time in a century.

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Michael Cohn Mark Nedelman • Jul 29, 2014 at 03:27

Your last prescient sentence required courage to utter. Europe's failure now is a vivid indicator of where it is headed. It is just too easy to call today's events an Israeli problem or a Jewish problem, which, of course, it is not. Israel is merely the canary in the mine, and, as the saying goes, 'as it goes with the Jews, so goes it with the rest of the world'.

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Levy • Jul 28, 2014 at 17:25

I have to disagree with the article's title. What is happening in Europe is very bad and worrisome, but it is not even remotely close to Kristallnacht and does not deserve any comparison to it.

The imported antisemitism is the new antisemitism in Europe. This much has been evident in the demonstrations in Paris, London and Berlin.

And yet Jewish multiculturalists like Daniel Cohn-Bendit still blame the "social exclusion" of the Muslim immigrants in Europe for their extremism (interview for Deutschlandfunk). In other words, he blames the Europeans for the antisemitism of some Muslims. Why doesn't people like him, above all, cannot see reality for what it is and still prefer to follow the leftist script of the eternal immigrant victim?

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bernard ross • Jul 28, 2014 at 16:10

The institutions of Europe: gov., church, etc. will turn a blind eye to Jew-killing while talking otherwise. The hunting down and beating of a young Jew in France from a Facebook page is the wave of the future. It is the strategy that will be used in many countries where there are Muslim populations. There will be terror tactics against the Jews in western nations and those nations will do nothing but talk.

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Carl • Jul 28, 2014 at 15:15

When will we learn? The Jew of Europe have not learned any of the lessons taught them by the Nazis. In the late 1960s and early 1970s in the USA, mainly on the east coast, Jews were set upon. The Jewish Defense League was formed (yes I was a member) and was able to teach the Jews how to defend themselves, both with weapons and hand to hand defensive methods. That day must also come in Europe or we will start to lose people due to murders and fatal beatings by these crowds. If their way of life was so great in their mother countries, why did they leave? Why are they the only groups who are not willing to assimilate and learn the language and customs of their adopted countries? I call upon my Jewish Brethren in Europe and elsewhere to organize before you are picked apart one by one. There is strength in numbers. When they see that you are willing to defend yourselves, they will stop picking on you. Bullies are basically cowards.

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DAVID B. • Jul 28, 2014 at 07:23

Europeans of all ancestries need to speak out loudly against such unlawful acts of violence. The rule of law, not Sharia law, needs to be followed. Individuals and groups that cannot abide by the rules of a peaceable, tolerant society should be either jailed or deported. West Europe needs to study its history and remember the lessons of the battles of Tours and Vienna.

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Thomas Kovacs DAVID B. • Jul 28, 2014 at 11:59

As you mention: The people who cannot abide by the rules.... Unfortunately many of these people are born here, groomed by their parents or peer group to reject democratic principles and adopt the ideology of jihad. You cannot deport them! So what do you do? What can you do?

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Simon DAVID B. • Jul 28, 2014 at 15:00

If you bring this up in Germany, as an ethnic German you are immediatelly called "xenophobic", "islamophobic", "racist" or whatsoever. Most online discussion boards (especially the mainstream ones) block comments like that and often delete your account.

The whole mainstream media, and here especially the public media with its billions in taxes runs a strict "Islam is nice and good for us" agenda. As viewer you get nothing but 100% rigged news.

Best example was the hiding of a protestant church (in some unimportant small town) that has been burned down by an Islamist mob, which was "enraged" by a Youtube video from a German Islamist in Syria. That was about 1 year ago and has been silenced to ZERO, literally ZERO by the media. Look for "Kirchenbrand in Garbsen" and you will only find a couple of local news plus some non-mainstream results.

My Bottom line is that you will find a lot, but no general public reaction. Not in Germany, not in France, not in Britain, not in Sweden or where ever. Apparently the "elites" need to play it to the bitter end.

If it wasn't serious, I'd call it ridiculous.

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Geoff Bairstow • Jul 28, 2014 at 07:14

I must say I did not realise that scenes of this nature were happening in Europe and in my own country, England. I only follow the mainstream media and I suspect a lot of these events have been doctored or edited for politically correct reasons.

I am appalled at these scenes and fear they can only get worse.I feel this is only the tip of the iceberg. The Gaza conflict is an excuse for all the rioting and the real cause and political agenda lies deeper.

I do not know the solution to this problem and the authorities seem to want to brush it under the carpet.

Keep up the good work of reporting these issues. It must be made public.

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JohnB Geoff Bairstow • Jul 28, 2014 at 14:19

"The Gaza conflict is an excuse for all the rioting and the real cause and political agenda lies deeper."

Coupling to that statement, I add the following...Islam claims that once a land has been inhabited by a majority populations of Muslim, that land is forever "ISLAMIC". To have an "Islamic" land taken back by it's early inhabitants, is an embarrassment to Islam. Perhaps the validity to claim a land would be based on a clearly defined boundary, an army to defend those borders, and the use of recognized emissaries/ambassadors in dealing with bordering states who either recognize or at least respect those borders.
Palestine, as defined by the current conflict, beginning in 1920-1948 worked to 'prevent' Jewish domination. Now in a second phase to "take it back" from the Jews tends toward failure in that regard as there was 'originally' no respected borders, no organized force to defend even vague borders and no recognized regional government for said ill defined borders, thus no seat of government and no recognized emissaries. Attempts at statehood have been kick-started but a failure to keep out foreign fighters who don't defend 'Palestine', but rather attack Israel. An inability of Palestinian defense forces to prevent foreign fighters and multiple armed groups acting lawlessly within the borders of Palestine, thereby prevent Palestine as from appearing or acting as a viable state. But even if that were not true, the mandate of Islamic doctrine to take back prior Muslim land makes all peace efforts worthless, especially in the light of spreading area encompassing JIHAD

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y Brandstetter MD • Jul 28, 2014 at 05:58

Islamic antisemitism preceded Nazi inspired antisemitism by 13 centuries. In fact Hitler dubbed Mein Kampf the Deutsche Kur'an. I must say that Islamic and Nazi antisemitism go well together and the question remains why do Jews think this will go away if they just lay low enough.

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The Snail • Jul 28, 2014 at 05:43

Whatever the wrongs and rights of the current Israel/Hamas conflict it is the Israeli government and Hamas who are responsible. Individual Jews are citizens of France, Netherlands, Germany and the UK. They may or may not support the actions of Israel. Many of those New Nazis come from an ideology that has always looked on Jews and Christians as lesser beings i.e. Classical Islam as implemented by the Ottoman Empire and Caliphates before that. It is a very sad day that many people with no religious axe to grind have been conned into supporting such anti-semitism.

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Max The Snail • Jul 28, 2014 at 12:30

Could you imagine if I walked into the streets of London dressed like the KKK holding a placard saying "Save Israel, bomb Palestine", I would be in the dock for racism (and I am not even Jewish). Something is going sadly wrong with this country. Everybody is whispering in corners and seedy back street pubs but nobody is doing anything -- we need to do more. Come on Douglas, give us a plan. As I am a gay woman these Islamists scare the crap out of me.

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Simon The Snail • Jul 28, 2014 at 14:48

At least in Germany they've already learned that lesson: At first they were chanting things like

When this created a -for German relations - intense outcry against these (~90% immigrant) demonstrators (usually immigrants with a certain background are allowed to do anything), they changed the slogans to

in 1967 I believe it was, Pierre Trudeau brought forth the Multiculturalism dogma in Canada..and political correctness was born. Myself, becoming politically aware in the late 80's, I saw it for what it was...a means to segregate each ehtnic minority - ply each with $$$/favours for their favourite complaints all in the name of Votes. Classic Left Wing garbage.

This went well for a time as most of these immigrants did in fact assimilate into our societies. It was only until the mid to late 90's when the immigration vacuum cleaner turned its voracious eye to the Middle east. But to be truthful this was not the beginning. The Muslim Brotherhood has had operatives in North America since the turn of the last century.

What to do..??

Thank god in our country we have Stephen Harper.. the only Western Leader to call a spade a spade. We have 1.5 years left of his Prime Ministership and I truly hope he institutes some heavy duty legislation that allows for deportation of anyone convicted of subversion...let's hope that includes every jihadist/terrorist.